imitate
/ˈɪmɪteɪt/verb
imitate is spelled I-M-I-T-A-T-E. The wrong spelling people search most is immitate: about 120 Bing searches a month in the United States (September 2025 to August 2026), about 2 in 10 of all searches for the word. Imitate is a verb meaning “To follow as a model or a pattern; to make a copy, counterpart or semblance of”.
How many letters and syllables are in imitate?
| Letters | 7: I-M-I-T-A-T-E |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 3 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | 1.9 times per million words; the 19,825th most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | 1; the most searched, immitate, about 120 Bing searches a month (all of them) |
Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation and the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary; written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media); Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026).
How do you spell imitate?
Imitate is spelled I-M-I-T-A-T-E. One wrong spelling is searched or written often enough to measure; together they are about 2 in 10 of the searches for imitate in either form.
Bing searches in the United States: the average month from September 2025 to August 2026 (Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, read September 30, 2026). Wrong spellings are taken from Wiktionary entries tagged "misspelling" and its obsolete or nonstandard forms, Wikipedia's Lists of common misspellings and the codespell dictionary, then measured. The proofreader's marks show the change that corrects each one.
How common is imitate?
Imitate appears 1.9 times per million words in written English, the 19,825th most frequent word form in the list.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
How do you pronounce imitate?
- US /ˈɪmɪteɪt/
Imitate has 3 syllables (counted from its American pronunciation in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: En-us-imitate.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Forms of imitate
- imitates present, singular, he/she/it
- imitating participle, present
- imitated participle, past
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does imitate mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
verb
- 1
To follow as a model or a pattern; to make a copy, counterpart or semblance of.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Imitate in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense to follow as a model:
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.
Where does imitate come from?
Borrowed from Latin imitātus, perfect active participle of imitor (“to copy, portray, imitate”), see -ate (verb-forming suffix). Cognate with French imiter.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).